Laws that legalize physician-assisted suicide do not empower patients; they empower doctors. Such a law is now being considered in the Legislature. Senate Bill 128 would protect physicians who commit such a shameful violation of their duty to their patients, even as it endangers those very patients.

I urge Californians not to be indifferent, but to tell their legislators of their firm opposition to SB 128.

I have been an oncologist for more than 30 years. I have also been a cancer patient. I have treated hundreds of patients for depression complicated by thoughts of suicide. And I, too, have sought treatment when I developed that illness. Thus, I have had ample opportunity to consider death, suicide and assisted suicide from both sides of the stethoscope. Let me tell you what I’ve learned.

People with terminal illnesses do not seek suicide, assisted or otherwise, because of pain. Patients in pain seek pain control, not death. Fortunately, modern medicine can reduce pain to ordinary levels that we all have experienced. The terminally ill do not seek suicide, assisted or otherwise, because of the burden of treatment. Patients who find treatment burdensome rightly have the option of simply discontinuing treatment.

Rather, without exception, those patients who have asked me to hasten their death did so out of despair. They despaired of having lives of value, of being the object of the loving care of others. They mistook being dependent for being a burden, or mistook being a burden for being contemptible. They were sick and weak, and mistook uselessness for worthlessness. Despair is indeed the sickness unto death.

My job as their physician is to help them through this existential crisis, to help them recognize the intrinsic value that remains within them despite their advanced illness.

I remember one particularly challenging case. A middle-aged man with recurrent cancer and a few weeks to live, a petty criminal estranged from his family, asked me why God was still keeping him alive when all he wanted was to die. Such conversations demand bracing honesty. I told him that I really didn’t know, and suggested that it was his job to discover the reason. A few weeks later, shortly before his death, he told me that he had taken my counsel to heart, and had re-established rapport with his son. He thanked me for having refused his earlier request for assisted suicide, and tearfully told me that these had been the best weeks of his life.

A doctor whose response to a request for assisted suicide is a scribbled prescription for a lethal drug does his patient the terrible disservice of abandonment. It is a tacit admission that the doctor agrees that the patient’s life is of no value. It is hard to imagine a more contemptuous act.

In the relationship with a sick and despairing patient, the doctor is already too powerful. This is true of patients from the upper crust of society and more true of patients who are poor, disabled, immigrant or ethnic minorities. Assisted-suicide laws empower the same physicians who have diagnosed – or misdiagnosed – their patients as having a life-limiting disease to give them a prescription for a lethal drug, instead of honestly attempting to relieve their despair.

Eric Chevlen is an oncologist and pain medicine specialist in Youngstown, Ohio, who spent half his career practicing in Northern California.

]]>spfun1@gmail.com (Steve)BlogTue, 26 May 2015 18:59:46 +0000Statement of the Association of Northern California Oncologists and the Medical Oncology Association of Southern California Regarding CMA’s change of position on Senate Bill 128http://noassistedsuicideca.org/item/362-statement-of-the-association-of-northern-california-oncologists-and-the-medical-oncology-association-of-southern-california-regarding-cma-s-change-of-position-on-senate-bill-128
http://noassistedsuicideca.org/item/362-statement-of-the-association-of-northern-california-oncologists-and-the-medical-oncology-association-of-southern-california-regarding-cma-s-change-of-position-on-senate-bill-128

Statement of the Association of Northern California Oncologists and the Medical Oncology Association of Southern California Regarding CMA’s change of position on Senate Bill 128

“Despite the amendments agreed to by the CMA and the authors of Senate Bill 128, the two oncology associations in California remain opposed to SB128. No amendments can change the fact that ‘an act that directly causes the patient’s death’ is contrary to the role of the physician.

For many practicing physicians, end of life issues are purely theoretical. For oncologists, it is an everyday part of their practice to assist the patient in a comfortable death, as many forms of Cancer are incurable. We feel that better palliative care efforts can improve end of life care when death is inevitable, without the guilt and ethical dilemma engendered by SB128.

As the physicians who will be most affected by SB 128, we continue to ask legislators to oppose this legislation.”

(Sacramento, CA) – Californians Against Assisted Suicide remains steadfast in its opposition to Senate Bill 128. A letter was sent to legislators last week that included groups such as the Association of Northern California Oncologists, Medical Oncologists Association of Southern California, California Foundation for Independent Living Centers, The Arc, Independent Living Center of Southern California, Indepedent Living Center of Silicon Valley, Disability Rights Education & Defense Fund and others opposing doctor-prescribed death - click here to view a copy of that letter.

The Oregon Medical Association similarly took a neutral position on the 1994 ballot measure to pass doctor-prescribed suicide. However in 1997, the Oregon Medical Association switched back to oppose and joined the campaign to overturn that recently passed Oregon law.

Statements by #NoOnSB128 Partners

Walter Newman, Jr., MD. Dr. Newman is a 35 year member of the California Medical Association and Family Physician in San Jose."The California Medical Association's change of position does not reflect the strong opposition to physician- prescribed suicide by many thousands of my colleagues throughout California. Senate Bill 128 flies in the face of the oath we took to safeguard the lives and welfare of our patients.

"The majority of my patients are farm workers. This bill will have a disproportionate and tragic impact on the low-income, immigrant, and disabled populations my colleagues and I serve. There is no right way to do a wrong thing."

Catherine Campisi PhD., past Director of the California Department of Rehabilitation appointed by Governor Gray Davis. She is also a long-time disability rights advocate.

“There are no amendments can fix a fundamentally bad public policy. Our coalition continues to oppose this deeply flawed legislation because of the dangers it poses to those living with disabilities or in vulnerable circumstances, particularly in a state as ethnically and economically diverse as California. Assisted suicide is inherently dangerous to those who are expensive to care for or who lack access to proper medical care, and rather than open up that pandora's box, we ought to be exploring how to expand hospice and palliative care to address the needs of those terminally ill. Assisted suicide and Senate Bill 128 are misguided efforts.”

Aaron Kheriaty MD, Associate Professor of Psychiatry and Director of the Medical Ethics Program at the UC Irvine School of Medicine

"While these amendments certainly give more protections to doctors, they do very little for the patient and further erode the doctor patient relationship. Indeed, the amendments highlight a central problem with this legislation: these bills are designed primarily to protect the prescribing physician, rather than to protect the vulnerable patient.

"Looking at the Oregon experience with assisted suicide, we must consider how the legalization of assisted suicide attitude influences society. Suicide is now a public health crisis: according to the CDC suicide is currently the 3rd leading cause of death among adolescents and young adults, and the 10th leading cause of death overall for adults. Since the law was passed in Oregon, overall suicide rates in that state are there now 35% higher than the national average."

"The question of assisted suicide policy needs to be considered in terms of how it impacts the broader society, particularly the most vulnerable, without economic means or health access, as well as people living with serious disabilities whose options are often diminished. These lawsuits and legislation like California Senate Bill 128 are not simply exercises in autonomy for such individuals.

"Hopefully our court system and legislators take into account the broader implications, particularly in a state as diverse as California. This latest effort does not change in the least the aggressive opposition from progressives like myself and a diverse range of organizations against assisted suicide."